


Blood Is Thicker Than Mud

by Bet_on_black



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Alternate Universe - Mob, Alternate Universe - Police, Bellamione - Freeform, F/F, I blame lockdown, I'm so sorry, My brain gives me weird ideas, Ones that won't leave me alone, Rating May Change, Slow Burn, Vague Hints of Drarry, eventual Bellamione
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-02-17
Updated: 2021-02-18
Packaged: 2021-03-13 05:20:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,432
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29521467
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Bet_on_black/pseuds/Bet_on_black
Summary: DCI Granger has been on the trail of a notorious smuggling ring for a while now. As she finally tracks them down to a warehouse by the Thames she's sure she has them banged to rights. All she needs to do is capture them.When she finds herself leaving the warehouse with no smuggling ring and an alarming wound there are more than a couple of questions that need answered...
Relationships: Hermione Granger/Bellatrix Black Lestrange
Comments: 14
Kudos: 39





	Blood Is Thicker Than Mud

**Author's Note:**

> Hello and welcome to yet another strange brain child of mine! This idea came to me in the very early hours of the morning and hasn't left me alone for weeks so I'm afraid I've had to start writing it and I'm going to foist it on you lot for shameless ego related reasons.
> 
> Leave me a comment and let me know what you think!

DCI Granger crouched low and whispered a quiet  _ lumos _ , producing just enough of a glow that the witches and wizards assembled could see her gesture for them to gather close. When they had all shuffled into an uncomfortable crouched huddle she pulled out a blueprint for the warehouse across the road. 

“The shipment arrived at the docks about an hour ago and our intel suggests it’ll be taken to the warehouse tonight for inspection and distribution across the city from there. Now I’ve got Finnigan circling the skies above as lookout, so he’ll give us a heads up when it arrives but I want us all in position before then so we can have the element of surprise on our side.” She pointed to the warehouse entrances on the blueprint. “I want all exits covered  _ before  _ they get there. That means disillusionment charms and soft feet, okay? They’re not to know we’re here until they’re in cuffs.”

Her team nodded, each one of them with a determined expression on their faces. They knew how important this bust was tonight. They’d been tailing the gang of notorious drug smugglers for weeks and planned to get every single one of them in one fell swoop. No fuss, no drawn out battle. Just one shot and take the lot of them down at once. Hermione had planned it meticulously, as always. They’d sneak in before the shipment itself and lie in wait for the Death Eaters to arrive. Then, once they had evidence of them handling the stolen goods, they’d swoop in and arrest them all. Her intel told her that all the big hitters would be there tonight.

As one, the unit performed disillusionment charms and made their way across the road to the empty warehouse. They filtered in through a side door, Abbott taking up post behind a stack of barrels to guard that exit, and the rest of them made their way to their posts. Hermione motioned to Thomas and Longbottom to follow her into the centre of the cavernous warehouse, taking up positions behind some boxes and an old desk. 

Just as they had settled into their hiding spots, the coin in Hermione’s pocket warmed. Finnigan’s message that the shipment was about to arrive. She pressed a finger to the coin, causing it to vibrate softly and heard the faint vibration of her team’s corresponding coins across the warehouse.  _ Places, people _ it seemed to convey and she saw Longbottom’s grip on his wand tighten.

They sat in silence for a moment before an old, worn out truck turned the corner outside and pulled in through the large opening directly across from them, the beam of its headlights temporarily blinding them. The doors to the truck squealed open at the same time the headlights were shut off, and three burly men got out of the cab and swaggered to the back of the truck to begin emptying it. Box after box appeared from the back of the truck until the men themselves were all but obscured from Hermione’s vision. Once the last box was unloaded the men reappeared from behind the boxes and squeezed themselves back into the cab, their work evidently done for the day, and reversed back out the warehouse.

“What now?” Thomas hissed at her from her left hand side. 

“We wait.” Hermione replied quietly. “They’ll be here soon enough. Those men were just the delivery lackeys. The big hitters will appear any moment now. Just wait for my signal.”

The coin in her pocket warmed again.  _ Incoming _ . She pressed another finger to her coin to alert her team and nodded stiffly to herself. This was it. If they got this right then she’d be up for promotion at long last. If nothing else it would certainly score her some decent points with Commissioner Dumbledore at long last. Harry was the clear favourite in their department, that much had become clear when Dumbledore had promoted him to Superintendent over her, despite the fact Harry never finished his paperwork or scarcely followed procedure when making his arrests.

Obsidian swirls of air started darting in and around the warehouse, followed by loud pops and the appearance of dark cloaked witches and wizards across the warehouse floor. A quieter, more delicate sounding pop came from just in front of the boxes and desk that Hermione, Thomas and Longbottom hid behind and a tall witch with a messy tumble of black curls appeared. She was clad entirely in black, like her cronies, only she seemed to have shunned the swishing cloak in favour of tight black jeans and what appeared to be a biker jacket. The witch swept her curls over her shoulder and sauntered forward to the boxes that had been unloaded from the truck. 

Hermione tapped once on her coin  _ (stay in position)  _ and watched as the witch ordered her crew about with a haughty voice “Well, what are you waiting for? Get them open! I want to make sure Borgin hasn’t sent us substandard goods again. The boss will have his head and ours if this is anything like the last batch.” She turned on the spot and shot a sneering smile across the room at one of her compatriots. “We don’t want that again,  _ do we, _ McNair?”

The man grimaced and rubbed at his arm, which Hermione noticed now was wrapped in thick white bandages. “No, Bellatrix…” He grumbled back at her and made his way towards the boxes, wrenching one of them open with the point of his wand.

_ Bellatrix Lestrange _ … Hermione had thought those raven curls had seemed familiar. They’d never met but her face was a familiar one that graced a number of wanted posters all across London. The woman was wanted for countless acts of violence, more than a few disappearances and at least three murders. Capturing the infamous Lestrange would all but certainly secure her promotion. She tapped the coin again, indicating to her team to wait for her signal. All she needed was for Bellatrix to take the bag of powdered unicorn McNair had pulled out of the box and was offering to her. Once she saw that happen the witch would be banged to rights. 

The dark witch had her hand outstretched to take the bag. Hermione was holding her breath in anticipation, waiting for the bag to touch the alabaster skin of her foe, when a noise to her right caught hers and Bellatrix’s attention. Longbottom, it seemed, had moved from his position, removed his disillusionment charm, and had his wand pointed directly at the witch.

“ _ Stupefy! _ ” he cried, before running to tackle the witch to the ground. Bellatrix merely raised an eyebrow at the spell that flew a clear two foot past her and side-stepped his stumbling charge.

“Well, well, well…” She purred, standing over Neville, placing the heel of her shoe on his wand arm to prevent him from reaching his dropped wand. “If it isn’t a Longbottom…”

Hermione cursed internally, wishing now that she’d switched Neville out for one of the Weasleys, but tapped her coin twice and stood from her own hiding place to rescue her teammate. She fired off three silent  _ stupefy _ s at McNair and another two wizards close by, before removing her own disillusionment charm and casting a  _ flipendo _ at Bellatrix herself.

Bellatrix turned quickly and threw up a shield, only being pushed back a pace by the knockback jinx. Upon seeing Hermione her face contorted into a snarl. “Fucking pigs!” she cried, drawing her wand from somewhere within her mound of curls. With a whirling motion tendrils of red magic whipped out at Hermione, crackling loudly as though charged with electricity as they rebounded off of her hastily thrown up shield. Out of the corner of her eye Hermione could see the rest of her team shedding their disillusionment charms and charging into the fray, steaks of magic lighting up the warehouse as they exchanged spells with the Death Eaters.

Neville had managed to scramble away from Bellatrix’s boot and had collected his wand now, but his spells were still wide of the mark. Half the spells she had to duck or shield herself from were his rather than Bellatrix’s. It seemed Bellatrix was facing the same issue, having to dramatically roll out of the way of a  _ stupefy _ intended for Nott, who was three metres to her right. She threw a jinx over her shoulder at Neville, catching him in the stomach with a beam of orange, and sending him flying backwards into a stack of empty pallets. Hermione would have been lying if she’d said she wasn’t relieved to have him taken out of the action.

Her relief was short lived though as Bellatrix turned her attention back to her duel with Hermione. She moved with such determined grace that Hermione was momentarily distracted from their fight, evading a flash of red light that burned the air in front of her cheek at the very last second. Bellatrix let off a manic cackle that cracked through the air like the crack of a whip.

“Pay attention, filth! Or you’ll end up on the pointy end of my wand!” She jibed in a sing-song voice that matched the dance-like, almost playful, movements she made whilst gleefully hurling spells across the room.

Hermione ducked as one electric blue spell shot overhead, only to be forced immediately to roll out of the way of the cascading boxes that the spell pulled down. She fired off another  _ stupefy _ and threw up a shield to block the next whirling attack from the raven haired witch. The spells coming from her opponent were relentless, leaving her breathless, desperate for a reprieve. Then, she saw it. High above them on the warehouse ceiling was a metal hook attached to a winch. She cast a silent  _ accio _ to summon it before rapid firing hexes at Bellatrix.

_ Jellylegs, Impedimenta, Relashio, Bat-Bogey Hex, Slugulus Eructo! _ Anything she could think of until… Yes!

“ _ Levicorpus! _ ” she cried, hoping that Bellatrix would still be recovering from the onslaught of spells and be taken off guard at last. 

Bellatrix soared into the air, as though hoisted by an invisible rope. Only the invisible rope wasn’t around her ankle. There was no rope. She was soaring through the air of her own accord, flying directly at Hermione.

She saw it all happen in slow motion but still didn’t have the time to react. Her body wouldn’t move until Bellatrix was almost upon her and then, entirely of its own accord, her wand arm whipped round in a slashing motion.

Bellatrix was blasted backwards. Away from her. The witch clutching her cheek in shock as she soared back through the air. By all rights she should have smashed into a mound of crates. It was where she was headed for after all. But just before the impact she disappeared into a wisp of dark smoke, as did her colleagues, leaving Hermione with her team and the last of the ricocheting spells.

“Dammit!” Hermione roared, kicking a nearby crate with such force it exploded on impact.

* * *

“So not only have you failed to bring back the unicorn horn… but you’ve managed to get yourself injured in the process.” A cold, high voice echoed about the dimly lit chamber. “You’re not slipping are you, Bella?”

Bellatrix stood ramrod straight, keeping her face as still as possible despite the stinging of her cheek. The angry red welt hadn’t stopped bloody stinging since she’d apparated back at their headquarters. Goyle, lumbering fool that he was, had tried to help her heal the wound by throwing half a bottle of Dittany at it.

It hadn’t worked. Stung like hell, sure. It hadn’t done anything to heal the wound though which was why she ended up standing there to take this rebuking. No doubt she would have been hauled over the coals for not securing the horns. That was a given. But her injury… Her injury made her look weak. Unreliable. 

“It won’t happen again.” She replied with a clipped tone. “The Mudblood just got a lucky shot, that’s all.”

“Hmm…” The voice replied. “See to it that it doesn’t Bella. I’d hate to have to…  _ dispose _ of you.”

She felt a cold sweat run down the back of her neck and resisted the urge to shiver. It wouldn’t happen again. She would make sure of that.

* * *

“Tshaa-ah!” she hissed and pushed the Medi-Witch away. “Leave it! It’s not going to bloody heal if you keep jabbing at it!” She didn’t mean to be so harsh but the pain in her cheek was excruciating. Every time the Medi-Witch touched it it seared wildly, like a burning pain. 

The Medi-Witch frowned but retreated all the same, accepting a muttered apology from a man with untidy black hair on her way out, closing the door behind her. Harry turned around slowly, running a hand across a tired face.

“Did you have to shout at her?” He asked and flopped down in the chair next to her. “She was only trying to help.”

Hermione didn’t reply at first, the pain in her cheek easing into a background stinging sensation. When she did reply it was quiet, no more than a murmur. “Sorry Harry. It just hurts is all…”

Harry nodded to himself. “The wound or how you got it?”

She quirked her lips briefly before replying slowly “Yes.”

“Do you need dueling practice, ‘Mione?” Harry teased, spinning his wand round in his hand.

“It was just a lucky shot. That’s all.” The words came out through clenched teeth, though her face remained stoic. “She won’t be so lucky next time, Harry. I can promise you that.” 

Harry stood then, patting Hermione gently on the shoulder. “Just take it easy ‘Mione. Drop off a report with Weasley when you can; but your first priority is to go and get that seen to. Knowing Bellatrix Lestrange that’ll be a cursed wound and will take more than Dittany to shift.” He straightened his tie before continuing. “When we have a solid idea of what’s going on we can take it to Commissioner Dumbledore and see how he wants to progress the investigation.”

* * *

The gangly form of the desk sergeant was draped over the front desk, soft snores emitting from a slack jawed mouth that had a small puddle of saliva gathering at its edge. Hermione merely rolled her eyes when she emerged from the corridor and saw Ron asleep at his post. Part of her thought she ought to leave him there for Harry to find but that part was overruled by her more sympathetic side as she strolled up to the desk. Weasley was a nice enough guy. They’d gone to school together and whilst he hadn’t been the high flyer that Hermione was, he wasn’t a complete idiot either. Just lacking in attention span really. She gave his arm a gentle shake and resisted the urge to laugh when he jumped to attention like Commissioner Dumbledore himself had just walked in.

His bleary eyes took a moment to take her in and, when he finally seemed to realise he wasn’t out on parade, he let his arm fall and a dopey grin slide on to his face.

“DCI Granger!” He hastily wiped the remnants of his sleep drool away. “Didn’t expect you to be back so soon. How’d the raid go? Hey, what happened to your face?” Ron cocked his head to the side like a Collie, confusion and worry mingling on his face.

“It’s nothing.” Hermione waved it off despite the still present sting. “Just a little scrape with Bellatrix Lestrange. Nothing I can’t handle. Some interesting reports come in tonight then?” She waved a hand at the scattered paperwork on the desk with a teasing smile. 

Ron blushed a deep red and scrambled to gather the papers up with his hands. “Um… I was uh, on a brea-” The words died in his mouth and he slumped back into his seat, bringing the papers with him. “Please don’t tell the Super?” He said with a look that a puppy dog would have been envious of. “I’m in enough trouble as it is after he caught me eating on duty the other day...”

Hermione smiled and let out a small chuckle. “Yeah, Longbottom told me about that. I think you might have gotten away with it if it had been some Drooble’s but an entire roast chicken? Hmm… Probably a bit much, Weasley. Kinda noticeable.”

Weasley ducked his head so that all Hermione could see of his head was his sleep muzzed ginger hair and the tips of his incredibly red ears. “Yeah…” He rubbed at the back of his neck before looking back up again, his dopey grin back. “I’ll go for something smaller next time. Maybe a steak or something.”

She chuckled softly. Weasley was always good for a laugh, she had to admit, and talking to him always seemed to make her feel better. In another lifetime she could see herself possibly being good friends with him. 

“Good idea Weasley. Listen, are you on duty tomorrow night? I’ve got a report to write for Potter and he said to drop it off with you.”

“Oh, tomorrow?” Weasley’s eyes darted up to meet her gaze. “I’m off duty. The WiMET Gala, y’know?”

“Oh.” Hermione replied, a feeling of dread sinking in. The blasted WiMET Gala.

“Yeah, thought I’d show my face.” He puffed out his chest a bit so that the sergeant badge (which was hanging upside down) stuck out. “Say…” He started slowly and Hermione felt the dread sink even further down in her stomach. “If you’re not on duty we could maybe… if you’re going of course and only if you want to! But we could, I don’t know, maybe grab a drink together at some point?”

She tried not to let her internal grimace work its way to the surface. Weasley was sweet. He really was. But there was no way in hell she would be getting a drink with him, or anyone else for that matter, at the WiMET Gala. She’d almost forgotten it was happening. Almost. She’d have to show face, of course. It wouldn’t look good to Commissioner Dumbledore if she didn’t. Anyone hoping for a promotion attended the WiMET Gala after all. It was the place to be seen, and more importantly, the place to be noticed by the Commissioner.

“Ah yeah… the Gala. I should probably pop in, do the rounds, that sort of thing.” She said noncommittally, glancing at her watch for something, anything, to look at other than Weasley. “If I see you there we can see about that drink, yeah? But I don’t really know when I’ll turn up. Things to do, you know? I wouldn’t want to keep you waiting!”

Ron nodded, still rubbing at the back of his neck. “Yeah, no, no worries! I’ll keep an eye out for you though!”

Hermione forced a smile, hoping it didn’t come across as pained. “Great! Well, I better be off! I’ll catch you later, Weasley.” She gave him what she hoped was a cheery looking wave and disapperated on the spot, thoughts firmly focused on her living room sofa.

* * *

Dumbledore peered over his half moon spectacles as the young wizard slipped into the room and closed the door quietly behind him. The man was worried, that much was obvious by the late night visit, but the ruffled black hair would have given it away despite the time. He’d been running his hands through it again, his nervous tick obvious to anyone in the know.

“It’s late, Harry.” He said gently. “What brings you to my office at this hour?”

Harry glanced up, barely meeting his gaze for a second before bowing his head again, addressing the floor instead. “It’s DCI Granger, Sir. The raid on the warehouse didn’t go as planned and she’s come back with an injury.”

“An injury?” The older man shifted forward in his seat, resting his chin on his clasped hands. “What kind of injury?”

Harry shuffled on the spot and chanced another look at his superior. “The kind that doesn’t go away, Sir.”

Dumbledore hummed to himself, contemplating the man’s words. Plenty of their officers got injured in the line of work, that was nothing new. The fact that Harry had felt the need to tell him in person, and at this hour, meant this was a bit more serious than the standard kind accident at work.

“I see… And who was behind this injury?”

“Bellatrix Lestrange, Sir.” 


End file.
